I've had to do odd things like find a HP Printer Driver cleaner from hp.com. Example at:
"Be aware, if you have other HP All-in-one, Deskjet or Photosmart printers or HP ScanJet scanners and Photosmart camera software connected and installed on the your computer, this utility may also remove components of those products and require you to reinstall the software included with those products. Before running this utility, uninstall the software for these products."
http://h10025.www1.hp.com/ewfrf/wc/softwareDownloadIndex?cc=us&lc=en&dlc=en&softwareitem=oj-11696-6
The whine noise could be the CPU fan. You didn't write enough about this PC so I'll offer this link:
http://reviews.cnet.com/4520-11319_7-6240575-1.html
The safe mode boot makes me think there are other issues but let's start with these two ideas.
Bob
Hi. I have a Vista Home basic operating system. I bought a new printer, which is a Cannon, and ever since I installed it, I've had problems. I used to have an HP Deskjet D1520 printer installed, but when I tried to uninstall the old program, my computer won't let me uninstall it. I've had it say a time or two that the program didn't wasn't installed correctly. Also, here recently my computer starting making a really high-pitched whining sound, like the processor is having to work overtime. I'm sure there is some sort of compatibilty issue, but I'm not sure what I need to do to correct it. Sometimes, when I reboot, my computer won't load back up and I have to go into safe mode to get my home page back up. Any ideas I could try?

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